32 PRIOR RESULTS DO NOT GUARANTEE A SIMILAR OUTCOME AT TORNEYS SELECTED TO SUPER LA WYERS WERE CHOSEN IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PROCESS ON PAGE 38.happen during the specific time that she killedhim, these things were in her mind when shekilled him. The totality of the picture is what Ithink moved the panel to support the clemency.”The morning after Jordan was released fromprison, she went to the University of Chicago tosee Moss.

“When you see a prisoner you have very
limited touching contact,” says Moss. “They
would let me take [Jordan’s] hand in a warm
handshake, with both my hands covering hers,
but that was the extent of what I was able to do.

As she came into our law school, we gave eachother the biggest, longest hug. No one told us tostop or walk away.”The case garnered national attention, andMoss appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show. “Itdoesn’t matter how intelligent you are,” Mosssays. “When the lights come on and you’restanding in front of Oprah, you just start toscream as loud as you can.”

MOSS GREW UP IN OCEANSIDE, LONG ISLAND.

Her father, Jason, sold advertising for the NewYork Daily News, and her mother, Carolyn, workedin the fashion industry.restaurant on the South Side,” says Moss. “AfterI graduated and decided to go back to NewYork, she offered me a job. If you understandbowling and pierogies, it’s just a small leap tounderstanding divorce law.”In 2002, Moss received a phone call fromNancy Chemtob, a family law solo practitioner,against whom Moss had faced off over theyears. “I thought she thought I was the meanestperson she’d ever gone against,” Moss says, butadmonishing Moss wasn’t the purpose behind thecall. “She said, ‘Quit! Let’s start a firm. We don’thave a lot of clients, we don’t have a lot of money,but that’s OK, it will come. Let’s just do it,’” Mossremembers. “And then she called me every 20minutes for the next three days, asking ‘OK, didyou decide yet?’”Eventually Moss decided it was a good move—she was in her early 30s, recently married, and ifthings didn’t work out at the fledgling firm shecould always use the begging strategy on herformer bosses.That wasn’t necessary.“She has an incredible memory, almostphotographic, and she really knows the law,” sayspartner Joshua Forman.“I am her greatest disappointment,” Moss jokes,adding, “But while I may not understand the worldof high fashion, I do understand that my clientsneed this amount of money to stay in that world.”Moss’ older brother, Peter, says she showed anearly knack for lawyering.

“She was always a very intense person andshe loved to argue, especially with an uncle ofours who was a Supreme Court justice in KingsCounty,” says Peter.

“At family dinners, at the end of the dinner, sheand her Uncle Freddy would go at it,” says Moss’father. “She was ultra-liberal and Freddy was prettyconservative, and boy did they have some to-dos.”She was also good with numbers. “I am one ofthe only divorce lawyers who was also a mathlete,and that is essential to divorce law,” she says. Sheattended the Wharton School of Business, and thatbackground in math and finance has indeed provenuseful in combing through and dividing assets.During Moss’ stint at the University of Chicago,family law attorney Eleanor B. Alter of Kasowitz,Benson, Torres & Friedman was a visiting professor.“And we thought, ‘She hasn’t seen the realChicago,’ so we picked her up in a ’ 78 Ford andtook her bowling and to an all-you-can-eat Polish